


Straight On Until Morning

by track_04



Category: Johnny's Entertainment, KinKi Kids
Genre: Alternate Universe, Dark, Dreams, Gen, Japanese Mythology & Folklore, Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-31
Updated: 2010-10-31
Packaged: 2017-11-14 17:47:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/517896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/track_04/pseuds/track_04
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Tsuyoshi needs him, Koichi is there. No matter what.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Straight On Until Morning

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ill_ame](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=ill_ame).



> Title and quotes taken from J.M. Barrie's _Peter Pan_. Written for 2010's je_squickfic. As always, extra special thanks to my super duper awesome beta, moogle_tey and other partner in crime, missmonster, for being so amazing and encouraging.

_Dreams do come true, if only we wish hard enough. You can have anything in life if you will sacrifice everything else for it._

ooo

The sky outside the windows of the small cafe is dark, the trees across the street whipping back and forth with the violence of the wind as Tsuyoshi reaches for the half-empty cup of tea set out on the table in front of him. The rim of the plain white mug is chipped and he takes a moment to stare at it, thinking that this is probably some sort of analogy that he's meant to puzzle out—chipped mug, half-full—but he blows on the faintly steaming liquid and takes a sip, letting the thought slip away from him as easily as it had come.

It can't be that important, really.

"We can't keep meeting like this."

Tsuyoshi smiles around the lip of his mug at the familiar voice, taking another slow sip and listening as the chair across from him scrapes against the floor. Probably scratching the already ancient flooring and making it look even worse, but he doubts anyone minds. What are a few more scratches in a place like this?

There's a quiet huff from across the table and Tsuyoshi sets his cup down, eyes lingering on the faint outline of a water ring on the table top before he looks up at his companion. "You're late."

"We can't keep meeting like this," the other repeats, but it sounds half-hearted at best. Tsuyoshi just smiles and points to the cup of coffee resting near his companion's right hand.

"Two creams, no sugar. Just like you like."

The other man frowns, looking faintly disapproving even as he reaches for the cup and takes a small sip. His mug is bright red and flawless, Tsuyoshi notices, not a crack to be found. "What did you want?"

Tsuyoshi shrugs, wraps one hand around his quickly cooling mug of tea and glances outside. The wind is picking up to an almost frightening intensity, strong enough that the trees look like they might just snap apart at any moment. There are a few people still out on the street, but they seem to be running for cover. Tsuyoshi watches them for a long moment before remembering the question and answering. "Nothing, really."

"There are other things I should be doing right now." His voice is more tired than angry, Tsuyoshi thinks as he turns to look at him.

"But you're not." Tsuyoshi watches as the other rubs a thumb against the side of his mug and he smiles a little, the expression feeling half-hearted even to himself. "You're here. So, drink your coffee, Koichi."

Koichi hesitates for a moment but lifts his mug and does as the other asks while the plate glass window beside them starts to rattle with the force of the wind.

ooo

It's too hot to be outside, Tsuyoshi thinks. It's the type of late summer heat that leaves you sticky and hot and feeling like your shoes might melt into the sidewalk if you walk too far, the type of heat that only small children and dogs can stand being out in, and even then just barely. He's not really a small child anymore—his eighth birthday is already a few months past—but he doesn't think that, even if he were still a little kid, he'd rather be out here melting in the measly shade of one of the few trees edging the building's tiny playground instead of inside, sprawled out in front of the fan in the living room.

He glances up at their building, eyes searching for the window that he thinks belongs to their apartment as he wonders just how much trouble he'd be in if he tried sneaking back upstairs now. It only takes a moment before he drops the idea, knowing that if his sister didn't kick him out of the apartment with admonitions to _just go play and stay out of the way, okay?_ , his aunt would. His sister had said that she'd come get him when dinner was ready before shoving a bucket of toy cars at him and all but kicking him out the door earlier, but he doubts that will be anytime soon.

Normally, he would have protested, tried to find some way to convince her to let him stay inside and watch TV or at least come out with him because playing by yourself is just no fun, but the look on his sister's face had been enough to kill any protests. His sister and his aunt might think that he's too little to really understand what's going on, but eight is plenty old enough to know when they're just trying to get him out of their hair for awhile and when they really need him to stay out of the way. The latter is almost always because some sort of grown up situation is going on, something that they don't want him to hear or see, and it almost always has to do with his mom having one of her bad days. Why it's okay for his sister to stay around and help he's not sure, since 14 doesn't really count as a grown up if you ask him, but he remembers his sister taking care of a lot of their mom's bad days on her own before they moved here, so he doesn't ever argue. Instead, he just takes whatever books or toys are being offered to him and lets himself be shuffled outside, or off to his bedroom, or wherever his sister or aunt decide is the safest, most out of the way place for him to be.

He's still bored and uncomfortably hot and sticky, but the next time he glances up at the window to their apartment, he doesn't feel any urge to sneak back inside. He stares up at the closed curtains and frowns, one hand pushing the little toy car it's holding away from him to roll off somewhere in the dirt. There's a shadow behind the curtains that he thinks looks vaguely like his mother, and he stares for a long moment before reaching up to rub sweat out of his eyes and then look away.

When he looks down, his car is rolling back towards him through the dirt. He watches it until it bumps against his foot and stops, flipping over onto its side with its back wheels still spinning. He rights it and looks up to see a little boy crouching in the dirt a few feet away from him, expression serious as he stares at Tsuyoshi's fingers around the car.

"Hey."

The boy jerks his head up, his eyes wide for a moment as they catch Tsuyoshi's, looking surprised or guilty or maybe a bit of both.

Tsuyoshi tightens his fingers around the car and stares at the other boy curiously. "What's your name?"

The kid frowns slightly and looks around, like he's not quite sure if Tsuyoshi is actually talking to him. After a minute of scanning the empty playground around them, he finally seems to realize that there is no one else there and he answers, his voice soft and a bit raspy, like he isn't quite used to talking, "Koichi."

Tsuyoshi nods, setting the car down in the dirt and pushing it slowly with one finger, watching the way Koichi's eyes track the movement and smiling a little. "I'm Tsuyoshi."

"Tsuyoshi," Koichi repeats almost dutifully, his frown deepening as Tsuyoshi moves his hand and the car stills.

"So, do you wanna play with me?" Tsuyoshi doesn't look at Koichi as he asks, but he can hear Koichi shuffling toward him through the dirt and when he looks up the other is less than a foot away, peering surreptitiously into the bucket with the rest of Tsuyoshi's cars. Tsuyoshi smiles and shifts onto his knees, reaching out to push the bucket closer to Koichi. "We could have a race. I'll let you play with whatever one you want."

Koichi leans further over the bucket, glancing up at Tsuyoshi uncertainly before he reaches in slowly and plucks a tiny blue sports car from the top of the pile. He lifts it up, eyeing it like he's afraid it might bite him. After a few seconds he finally seems to decide that nothing dreadful is going to happen and sets the car down into the dirt, his face breaking out into a smile. "Let's race."

ooo

_All the world is made of faith and trust and pixie dust._

ooo

"We can't keep meeting like this."

Tsuyoshi smiles a little at the sentiment and lifts his head from where he's hunched over a stack of papers on his desk, swiveling his chair around to find Koichi standing in the doorway to his cubicle with a sour look on his face. He has two paper cups in his hand, and Tsuyoshi's smile only broadens as he clears the haphazard pile of papers from the free chair in his office and motions for the other to sit. "You said that last time. And the time before that. And the time before that."

Koichi sits, reluctantly, warily eyeing the pictures tacked crookedly to the corkboard walls around them, covering every available inch. He doesn't bother looking away as he offers Tsuyoshi one of the cups.

They're all drawings, most done in pencil or black ink, but a few with touches of messy color, all done in Tsuyoshi's own hand. Some are on full sheets of paper, some on the backs of faxes or receipts or on napkins ripped jaggedly around the edges. Every last picture is of a pair of eyes, wide open and staring. None of them ever blink.

"They freak you out?" Tsuyoshi motions to the pictures, pulling Koichi's attention away from them as he sips his tea. The pictures freak his co-workers out, he knows. They've all stopped coming to his desk to talk to him except for Taichi, who is very careful to only look at Tsuyoshi and never at the walls when he's there. Sometimes Tsuyoshi thinks he can hear them whispering about him through the walls of his cubicle. He knows he doesn't imagine the worried glances that they give him, most of which aren't even subtle.

He's not so sure what the big deal is. They're just eyes.

"Not really." Koichi shrugs and takes a sip of his own drink. "I shouldn't be here."

"But you came anyway," Tsuyoshi points out, resting his now half-empty cup on the edge of his desk. "And I invited you. No one's going to care if you're here if I invited you."

Koichi sighs, looks like he wants to say something but hesitates. Tsuyoshi knows Koichi hates it when he purposefully misunderstands him like this, which is probably why he does it so much these days. "You need to stop doing this."

"They're just pictures." Tsuyoshi looks at the pictures, ignoring the real meaning behind the other's comment. Koichi gives him a look that is just annoyed enough to make him smile and the light above his desk starts to flicker. He thinks he can hear someone whispering his name from the cubicle behind him, but he ignores it and focuses his attention on Koichi instead.

ooo

When Tsuyoshi's sister kicks him out of the house again a few days later, Koichi is there waiting for him. Tsuyoshi smiles as he plops down beside him in the dirt, digging the blue sports car out of one pocket and holding it out to him.

Koichi smiles a little as he takes it, waiting for Tsuyoshi to dig the bright orange Volkswagen out of his other pocket before they start to silently map out a race track in the dirt between them.

They play together for hours and Tsuyoshi doesn't look up at the window to their apartment once. He and Koichi don't talk much aside from making car noises at each other, but he's happy about it. Some of the kids in his class think he's weird because he doesn't talk much, but Koichi doesn't seem to mind.

When his sister calls him in for dinner and Koichi tries to hand him back the tiny blue car, he just shakes his head and smiles, telling him to just bring it back the next time they play together.

ooo

_Young boys should never be sent to bed. They always wake up a day older._

ooo

The carpet feels damp beneath his feet, but Tsuyoshi ignores it, digs his toes in as he leans against the back of the couch. He thinks maybe he can smell copper in the air, and he wonders if he looks down if the carpet will be stained a deep red. He doesn't really care about the answer one way or the other, so he looks to the doorway instead.

Koichi is standing there, looking around uncertainly. He's not looking at the carpet or Tsuyoshi might be tempted to ask what he sees.

Tsuyoshi follows Koichi's gaze, looks at his walls. Walls that stare back at him, covered in eyes. He hadn't bothered with slips of paper here, the pictures drawn right onto paint and faded wallpaper with whatever had been handy at the time. Sometimes when he paces his living room floor late at night, unable to sleep, he thinks he can feel them tracking his movement.

"Tsuyoshi—" Koichi turns back to him and draws himself up to his full, unimpressive height and gives a look that can best be described as stern.

"We can't keep meeting like this, right?" Tsuyoshi watches Koichi deflate a little and smiles to himself, reaching for the mug resting on the edge of his coffee table. The tea inside is cold and has the faint tang of copper, but he drinks it anyway, watching Koichi for a long moment.

The other finally gives in and moves toward the couch, the carpet making soft, squishy noises beneath his feet. He stops a few steps away and hesitates for a moment before Tsuyoshi pats the empty cushion beside him, then he sits down.

"It's getting worse," Koichi comments. His voice is bland, but when Tsuyoshi looks his expression is troubled.

"I'm getting worse, you mean."

"Yes. You need help."

Tsuyoshi shrugs and sets the tea aside, stares at a set of eyes on the far wall, bright red and unblinking. "That's what you're for, isn't it?"

"No." Koichi sounds frustrated and Tsuyoshi reaches out on impulse and pats his hand.

"I never really expected you to save me, you know." Tsuyoshi turns his head to meet his eyes. He can hear voices through the walls of his apartment, a scream like in a horror movie. It sounds hollow, though, distant. Like it's being filtered through a too loud television set. "I learned my lesson with that one."

Koichi pulls his hand away, his expression sad. "I know."

ooo

Tsuyoshi and Koichi have been playing together for about two weeks when he decides that he's sick of playing cars in the dirt and invites Koichi upstairs to his room instead. It's one of the good days where he hasn't been kicked out with explicit orders to keep busy, and he thinks that if he's going to stay inside and play that Koichi might as well be there with him.

Koichi seems a bit reluctant to leave the playground when he asks him at first, but after a few minutes he seems to change his mind and gives in, letting Tsuyoshi lead him through the side door and up the stairs. He's already told Tsuyoshi that he doesn't live in this building when he'd asked, but he doesn't look surprised or even interested in what he sees as they tromp up the stairs and down the hall towards Tsuyoshi's apartment. Tsuyoshi can't really blame him, though. The building isn't really that interesting.

"Hey, twerp." Tsuyoshi's sister leans around the doorway to the kitchen as he and Koichi toe their shoes off in the entry way. For a split second, Tsuyoshi is afraid she's going to kick him back outside or tell him it's not a good time to have friends over, but she doesn't even give Koichi so much as a second glance. Instead, she meets Tsuyoshi's eyes and holds a finger to her lips as she motions to their mother sleeping on the couch. Tsuyoshi nods and relaxes a little as she disappears back around the doorway. He reaches out to take Koichi's hand and leads the other boy to his room, careful to avoid the squeaky floorboards in front of his door.

Behind him, Koichi steals a glance at the mom shaped lump on the couch before they disappear around the corner and into Tsuyoshi's room.

ooo

_"Can anything harm us, mother, after the night lights are lit?"_

_"Nothing, precious," she said. "They are the eyes a mother leaves behind her to guard her children."_

ooo

The train car is nearly empty as Tsuyoshi climbs on board, ignoring the way the bottoms of his shoes stick to the floor as he walks to the back and takes a seat beside the only other passenger. Koichi looks up and meets his eyes as he settles in beside him, but doesn't look surprised to see him here.

Tsuyoshi rests his hands against his knees and watches as Koichi turns away, eyes fixed on the dark brown stain on the back of the seat in front of them. He can smell copper and he glances down at his hands, isn't surprised to see the dried blood crusted beneath his fingernails. It's always so hard to get out.

"No coffee this time?" It's Koichi who finally breaks the silence, his voice a bit rougher than usual. The sound of it eases something in Tsuyoshi's chest and he smiles, stops thinking about the blood on his hands.

"I wasn't sure you'd be here. You know you're getting harder to track down."

"I don't really have time to be meeting you like this."

"But you keep doing it anyway." Tsuyoshi sighs and closes his eyes for a minute. When he opens them again and turns to look out the window, they're passing a set of familiar streets, the lights outside the homes and store fronts lighting up the darkness. "What's five minutes here and there going to hurt, anyway?"

Koichi turns to look out the window and doesn't answer. Tsuyoshi's slightly disappointed, even if they both already know what Koichi would have said; Tsuyoshi already had his own answer all picked out, but now he can't use it.

Tsuyoshi lets the silence stretch between them for a moment, the metal on metal clanging of the train as it moves down the tracks, shifting around corners, the only sound. He can't even hear Koichi breathing and wonders briefly if he even is, if he ever does. Not that it really matters one way or the other.

He can make out the back of a man's head through the opening leading into the car in front of him, his dark hair clipped short and carefully styled. Tsuyoshi wonders what the man's face looks like, if it looks anything like he would imagine. Or maybe the man doesn't have a face at all. Just a stretch of blank, shapeless skin that gives the impression of something that isn't there.

"I think maybe I'm going crazy." He can hear more than see Koichi looking at him, can practically feel the weight of his gaze as he continues, his voice calm. The thought of going crazy doesn't really bother him as much as it should. It's just the wondering what on earth he's going to do once he gets there that's troubling. "Do you think I'll end up like her?"

"I don't know," Koichi answers and Tsuyoshi turns just in time to see him shrug, the gesture almost defeated. "Maybe."

At least he's honest.

ooo

Tsuyoshi hasn't ever told Koichi that his mom's sick, but Koichi's never asked about it, either. He looks at Tsuyoshi's mom a bit oddly sometimes if they pass her while she's lying on the couch or sitting at the kitchen table staring at nothing, but he never comments. Tsuyoshi's thankful for it, because he's had enough of the questions and pity from adults at their old apartment building, back when it was just him and his sister and his mom, whispering about _that poor little boy and his sister, first losing their father and now with their mother acting like this_. He likes Koichi, but he thinks if the other ever asked why his mom laid on the couch all the time but never really slept or where his dad was or why his sister was always the one who cooked dinner when their aunt had to stay late at work, he wouldn't want to be friends with him anymore.

He's glad that Koichi is never around on the bad days, that he never happens to follow him inside after school on one of the afternoons when the curtains are drawn tight in the living room and the apartment feels empty and eerily quiet.

Days like today, when as soon as Tsuyoshi opens the front door and steps into the entryway he knows that something is wrong. Usually his sister is with him, at least, to push him towards his room with instructions to do his homework while she goes to deal with things, but tonight she hadn't met him on the walk home and so he's all alone.

He takes the time to shut and lock the door behind him and toes off his shoes, puts his bag in the proper place. He knows he should probably just go outside and play on the swingset until his sister or his aunt gets home, but he can hear a soft mumbling coming from the living room and he moves toward it without really thinking. It takes his eyes a minute to adjust, but when they do he can make out his mom huddled on the end of the couch, a blanket pulled tight around her shoulders as she stares off into nothing. She turns her head just as he steps into the room, the whites of her eyes bright and he freezes, actually feeling a little bit afraid.

His mom doesn't talk to or even look at him much anymore, but when she does she's either sad or looks like she doesn't even realize he's there. The look she's giving him right now says that she knows that he's there, but it's not sad. It's frightened.

"Come here." His mother's voice is raspy and makes him jump, startled. He almost shakes his head or turns to run, but he can hear his sister's voice in the back of his head, reminding him that _mom needs us, so we have to be good, okay_?

He swallows and shuffles toward her, clenching one fist at his side. He stops a few feet in front of her and tries not to look scared.

"Did they hurt you?"

He jumps as she grasps his shoulders and pulls him closer, turning him from side to side, inspecting his face and hair and clothes for some sort of imagined injury. "Who?"

"Them," she mumbles, an edge of panic in her voice. "The creatures who come after me in my sleep."

"But you don't sleep."

She nods, doesn't seem to notice how small and scared his voice sounds as she tightens her grip on his shoulders and pulls him closer. "Not anymore. It's the only way I can keep them out of my head. Your aunt thinks I'm crazy, you know. She thinks it's all in my head and I just need to start sleeping again but she doesn't know. It doesn't matter if I sleep, anyway, because they're always there when I do, eating my dreams."

He swallows and nods his head, his eyes wide, wishing that his sister was here. She would know what to say, what to do to make mom calm down. She'd listen or maybe give her one of those pills that Tsuyoshi knows she and his aunt have been hiding in mom's drinks on the bad days, and Tsuyoshi could escape to his room or outside with Koichi and everything would be okay.

But she's not here. His mother smiles at him and reaches up to pet his hair, and for a second she looks almost like she did when his dad was still around. "They want you when they're done with me, but I won't let it happen. I promise."

"Okay," he whispers and hopes his mom can't see just how happy he is when he hears the front door open and his sister calls out to him.

ooo

_Boy, why are you crying?_

ooo

The plastic seat of the swing is warm against the back of his legs, even through a layer of denim, as Tsuyoshi rocks himself back and forth, trailing the toe of his shoe idly through the dirt. The building looks the same as he remembers it (of course), no older and no newer, just the same.

One of the windows is open and he can hear distant voices from inside. It sounds like one of them says his name, but he ignores it.

The swing next to him creaks and a hand thrusts a familiar paper cup beneath his nose. He takes it and offers Koichi a half-smile. "I didn't even call you this time."

"I was free. Thought I might find you here." Koichi shrugs it off and stares up at the building. It sounds like maybe one of the voices inside right now is screaming.

"I never actually blamed you, you know." Tsuyoshi catches Koichi's frown out of the corner of his eye, but doesn't look directly at him, sips at his tea and stares at the open window a few floors up instead. "I didn't mean what I said back then."

"I know." Koichi sighs, the sound hollow, and Tsuyoshi finally looks at him, noticing that the other hasn't bothered to get himself a cup of coffee this time.

"I never blamed her, either."

"I know."

"I blame myself." This last one is soft, barely even a whisper, but Tsuyoshi can tell by the way Koichi's shoulders stiffen that he hears it. He waits for some sort of angry retort, but a long silence greets him instead.

The chains on Koichi's swing creak as he shifts in his seat and when he finally speaks it's quiet and sad. "I know, but you shouldn't. It was never your fault."

"I'm the reason you were there," Tsuyoshi points out. "I'm the reason you even started coming around."

"You were a child. There was no way you could have known what would happen."

Tsuyoshi shrugs, chucks his half-full cup at a nearby bush, not caring where it lands. The breeze picks up around them and he can smell something far away burning. "Doesn't matter."

Koichi sighs.

"You know what the worst part is?" Tsuyoshi leans over, starts to draw a set of eyes in the dirt at his feet and smiles. "If I had a chance to change things, I don't know what I'd do differently. I don't know if I'd want to."

Koichi rises from the swing without comment and crosses the playground to retrieve Tsuyoshi's cup from the bushes. The footprints he leaves behind in the dirt turn a faint red before drying up and disappearing under the sun and for just a moment Tsuyoshi thinks he can smell copper again.

ooo

It's not one of the good days—Tsuyoshi knows that the good days have been happening less often lately, even if his sister and his aunt think that they're managing to hide it from him—but Koichi is up in his room with him anyway, huddled next to him at the foot of his bed. Tsuyoshi has a book spread open on his lap and is reading from it in a hushed voice; when Tsuyoshi had asked if Koichi wanted to read, the other had just looked confused for a second before mumbling something about _not knowing how_ and looking embarrassed, so now he's just reading out of the book for both of them.

Tsuyoshi has no idea how anyone could be eight years old and not know how to read, but Koichi's kind of odd, so he can't say it really surprises him. The oddness is part of the reason that he likes him, anyway.

"I don't get it." Koichi stops him mid-sentence and frowns, staring at the book with a mixture of confusion and distaste. "Why would anyone want to live in Neverland?"

Tsuyoshi frowns back at him and sighs. "Why wouldn't they? There's always some sort of adventure there and you never have to grow up and you never get bored—like living in a dream or something."

"Why would anyone want to live in a dream?"

"Because you can do whatever you want in a dream. It's perfect."

"Dreams aren't perfect. They're weird and scary and nice sometimes, but they're not perfect." Koichi gives him a look that reminds Tsuyoshi of his aunt or his sister when they're trying to explain something to him that they don't think he'll understand.

"Real life isn't perfect either. At least when you're dreaming if something bad happens it isn't real." He scowls and snaps the book shut, not even caring how loud he's being. "I'd run off to Neverland and never come back if I could."

"What about your family?"

Tsuyoshi hesitates for a moment and then shrugs. "They could come with me if they wanted."

"I thought they didn't allow grown ups."

"Well, then, you could come with me," Tsuyoshi mumbles, running a finger around the edge of the book and not chancing a look over at the other. "And I'd just come back to visit. Like Peter does with Wendy. It wouldn't be that bad if you were there."

Koichi's quiet for so long that Tsuyoshi starts to feel stupid for saying anything, but then he feels Koichi's arm around his shoulders as he whispers, sounding almost guilty, "I'd go with you if you asked me."

ooo

_We must leave at once. Before we, in turn, are forgotten._

ooo

He's back in his living room again. The carpet isn't just damp under his feet but sopping this time and he looks down, not surprised by the blood that he sees there. He turns his head and can see it running over the edge of the carpeting, out through the doorway into the kitchen. If he listens hard enough, he's pretty sure he can hear it running over the linoleum.

"It would have been better if you'd never found me again, you know."

He turns and isn't surprised to find Koichi standing in the doorway, looking worried. He watches as the other crosses the room, the way the blood moves around his feet almost mesmerizing. Tsuyoshi stares at it, too distracted to even notice when Koichi takes a seat beside him, this time without prompting.

"I'm making it worse, not better."

"I don't care," Tsuyoshi says, forcing his eyes away from the floor and up to Koichi's face. He can feel the eyes on his walls watching him.

"I do," Koichi snaps back, frowning in that way that Tsuyoshi knows is more worried than actually annoyed.

"Then why do you keep coming back?" It's a perfectly reasonable question, but the way that Koichi looks at him, he might as well have just told him that the sky was red and the moon was made of cottage cheese.

The apartment is quiet for the moment, except for the sound of the blood on the kitchen floor, steady like a river, and a voice through the wall that sounds like Tsuyoshi's sister. Koichi takes a deep breath and Tsuyoshi thinks _well, that answers that question_ , but before he can say as much aloud the other whispers sadly, "Because you keeping asking me to."

ooo

Tsuyoshi is dreaming about purple elephants and a talking fish and a lot of other things that don't quite make sense when his bed shifts and he's suddenly awake, rubbing his eyes and blinking out at the darkness.

His mother is sitting on the edge of his bed and staring at him, her eyes wide and unblinking in the darkness. He stares back silently, not really sure what to say. Finally, after a long, long moment she blinks and reaches down, brushing his hair away from his forehead with a smile that looks sad and tired, but more like his mom than she'd looked a moment before.

"Mom? Are you okay?"

She shakes her head slowly and reaches down to tuck the covers in around him with a sigh. "Your aunt 's going to send me away soon."

"No she won't," Tsuyoshi whispers and almost believes it. He's overheard his aunt whispering into the phone when she thought he was already in bed asleep about how she needs _to find a place that can take better care of her than we can here_ , but he knows that he isn't supposed to know that. He doesn't really think that his mom is supposed to know, either, but he doesn't know whether or not he should lie to her. It doesn't feel right, but she looks so much like her old self right at this moment that it's hard to remember that there are ever bad days. Lying just seems easier. "She wouldn't do that."

"It's okay if she does. It might be better that way." She shakes her head and turns her head to stare out the window over his bed. "If I go away, maybe I'll be able to sleep again without him stealing my dreams."

"Him?"

"The little boy whose name is on my pillow." She stands and her eyes drift back to the window, looking less focused than before. She smiles at him one last time before she turns and leaves, and it's a long time before Tsuyoshi can fall asleep again.

When he gets home from school the next day, his aunt and sister are both already home and his mother has been sent away.

ooo

_You know the place between sleep and awake, the place where you can still remember dreaming?_

ooo

Tsuyoshi is in his childhood bedroom, the one that he's pretty sure his aunt and his mother are using for storage now that he's grown up and out on his own, but right now it looks exactly the same as he remembers it when he was eight. He can even see a few toy cars scattered in the corner and his school uniform hung over the back of a chair, waiting for him when he wakes up the next morning.

Except he won't, because he's not a kid anymore and this, this is all just a dream. But it makes him smile anyway.

Koichi is sitting at the end of his bed and is staring up at him with sad eyes, once again the little boy that Tsuyoshi remembers crawling around with in the dirt. He has a book open across his knees, one hand resting against the pages, and Tsuyoshi doesn't need to look any closer to know which book it is.

He probably should point out that he never asked Koichi to come this time, that the other had just shown up on his own, but he doesn't. Instead, he takes a seat on the bed and reaches for the book, flipping it back to the beginning.

Koichi leans over to get a better look as Tsuyoshi starts to read, but doesn't stop him to ask any questions this time.

ooo

Koichi is sitting on the floor by Tsuyoshi's bed when he wakes up one morning exactly a week after his mother had been sent away. Tsuyoshi blinks at him sleepily and sits up with a frown. "How did you—"

Koichi lifts a finger to his lips and makes a shushing sound as he climbs into bed beside him, a pillow clutched against his chest. Tsuyoshi thinks that maybe he's dreaming and starts to let himself drift back to sleep, only to have the other wake him up again with the sharp pinch to the side. He makes an annoyed noise, but opens his eyes again, sitting up when he notices the sad way that Koichi is watching him.

"What's wrong?" Tsuyoshi whispers, suddenly aware of just how quiet the apartment is around them. He wonders how Koichi managed to get in here when their front door is always locked at night and his aunt and sister must still be sleeping down the hall, but he doesn't get a chance to ask.

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"Your mom." Tsuyoshi isn't sure what to say to that, because he hasn't even seen Koichi since his mom left and he doubts he would have told him if he had. Koichi doesn't really give him time to answer before he continues, though, his voice soft and sad. "I didn't mean to hurt her. I was just trying to help."

"What?" Tsuyoshi frowns, leaning away from the other without really meaning to. "You didn't hurt her. She just—she's just having problems sleeping, so she had to go somewhere for awhile. Once she can sleep again she'll be fine."

"I stole her dreams," Koichi says, soft and serious, and Tsuyoshi freezes, remembering his mother telling him about the name on her pillow. "I was just going to take the bad ones, but then something went wrong. I ended up taking them all."

"Then give them back."

"I can't." Koichi shakes his head and he looks sad, almost as sad as anyone Tsuyoshi's ever seen. It doesn't make Tsuyoshi feel any better, though. "Not yet."

"Why not?" Tsuyoshi asks, not caring if he sounds angry.

Koichi pulls the pillow away from his chest and lays if flat against the covers instead of answering. Tsuyoshi has just long enough to recognize the flowered pillow case as his mother's and to feel another surge of anger before Koichi strips it off and flips the pillow over, pointing to a small, messily written character in one corner. "I can't leave while this is still here."

Tsuyoshi can remember an afternoon about a year ago when he put it there, copying the character diligently from a book about monsters and imaginary creatures hidden away in one of the boxes of his father's things. It had seemed a bit silly to him at the time, but he'd overheard his mother telling his aunt on the phone that she was having nightmares and she'd been so sad since his dad had died that he'd wanted to help; when he remembered the book and the story about the creature that would chase away bad dreams if you wrote its name on your pillow, he'd done it without thinking, thinking that maybe it was something his dad would have done.

It was a silly enough thing that he'd forgotten about it completely, until now.

"Then we'll get rid of it," Tsuyoshi says and reaches for the pillow, wondering how long it will be until his mom can dream again. He tries not to look at Koichi as he does it, tries not to feel angry at him because it's easier than being angry at himself, but he doesn't quite manage it.

Koichi puts a hand on his arm and Tsuyoshi can't help but look up as the other starts to speak. "I have to leave."

"You're not even going to help me?" Tsuyoshi doesn't try to keep the anger or hurt out of his voice. He watches Koichi shake his head and lashes out, pushing the other boy away from him, off the bed and down onto the floor with a solid thump. "Fine, then, go. I don't need your help anyway."

Koichi stares up at him from the floor and nods slowly. "I hope your mom gets better soon."

"No thanks to you," Tsuyoshi says, tugging at the corner of the pillow. The material is old enough that it gives easily under his hands; the symbol rips in half beneath his fingers and Koichi vanishes before his eyes, without even so much as a good bye.

He waits for Koichi to come back, looks for him out on the playground after school for the next few weeks, but he never shows up. He wants to apologize, but as time passes it starts to seem less and less important, and eventually he starts to forget just who it was he was looking for in the first place.

ooo

_Never say goodbye, because goodbye means going away and going away means forgetting._

ooo

Tsuyoshi is back in his childhood bedroom with Koichi again, but this time when he hops up onto the bed next to the other and takes the book from him, he realizes that they're both little boys. It feels strange to suddenly be eight years old again, but not particularly wrong.

He smiles at Koichi and bumps their shoulders together and is pleasantly surprised to see the other smiling back at him, even if it is brief and a bit resigned.

"You know if I keep coming here like this, someday you might not be able to leave," Koichi says, but the protests sound half-hearted at this point. "We're not meant to spend this much time with the same person's dreams."

"It won't hurt you, will it?"

"I don't think so."

"Then I'm willing to risk it." Tsuyoshi shrugs and ignores the annoyed look that Koichi gives him.

"You're really okay with just going to sleep and never waking up? Being caught in a dream forever?"

"Living in a dream wouldn't be so bad," Tsuyoshi mumbles and catches Koichi's reluctant smile out of the corner of his eye. "Even if they're weird and scary they're sometimes nice, too."

"And when bad things happen here, at least they're not real?"

"I don't really care if they are real." Tsuyoshi smiles lazily back at him. "Bad things don't really bother me when you're around."

ooo

It's a night years later, after Tsuyoshi has grown up and become an adult and gotten an apartment and a boring but respectable job, when he happens across a book that he'd all but forgotten about tucked away with some of his things. He can't really explain why he opens it up to the chapter about dream eaters or why the character for _baku_ written at the top of the page looks so familiar at first, but it only takes reading the first few lines of the story before he starts to remember.

By the time he's done with the story he not only remembers everything, but he thinks he understands it all better now, how his mother had been too sad for Koichi to tell the bad dreams from the good and he'd eaten them all in his confusion; how Tsuyoshi had to be the one to destroy the symbol since he was the one who put it there; how Koichi hadn't left because he'd wanted to, but because without the symbol on that pillow he just hadn't been able to find his way back.

How much he misses his friend. How much he's always missed him, even when he couldn't remember who he was.

It's a few nights later when he drags the book out again and flips his pillow over, drawing the character carefully in one corner and above it, just to be certain, Koichi's name. When he goes to sleep that night, Koichi is there, waiting for him.

ooo

_So come with me, where dreams are born and time is never planned. Just think of happy things, and your heart will fly on wings, forever, in Never Never Land!_

ooo

The hallways of the hospital are silent, long abandoned as Tsuyoshi wanders along them, the sound of his foot falls echoing silently against the dirty tiles. This isn't a place that he thinks he's been before, although reason and the several dozen books on dreams he's read in the past year tell him that if he's dreaming about it then he's probably seen it somewhere.

It looks a bit like the hospital near his aunt's apartment, the one they'd kept his mother in for the long months that it had taken her to get her dreams back. If that's the case, then it's only fitting.

He wonders what the authors of all those books about dreaming that he's read would have to say about this particular bit of symbolism. He wonders what they'd have to say about him and the effort he puts into dreaming, the things that he does to make sure that every time he closes his eyes, Koichi is right here with him.

Koichi is sitting in a stiff backed plastic chair when Tsuyoshi rounds the corner, discarded syringes and piles of bloodstained paper and clothing covering the floor at his feet. He has a paper cup in each hand and Tsuyoshi smiles at that, something making a wet sounding crunch beneath his feet as he hurries down the hallway to take a seat beside him.

"This is a new one." Koichi hands him one of the cups and leans forward a little, letting his gaze wander up and down the hallway, no doubt taking it all in. He never seems bothered by any of the things that Tsuyoshi dreams, not even when they're sitting in a room full of corpses or staring out the window as the sky rains blood.

"You like it? This one took a lot of work. It's getting a lot harder to scare myself these days." Tsuyoshi lifts his cup and breathes in deeply. The smell of the tea doesn't quite cover the smell of blood he's finally noticing in the air around them, but he doesn't really mind. After months and months of sharing his dreams with Koichi, he's kind of getting used to it.

"It's interesting." Koichi shrugs, gaze settling on Tsuyoshi's face. "But you know you won't be able to keep this up forever."

"Then I'll keep doing it for as long as I can," Tsuyoshi says, stretching his legs out and poking at a pile of rags that he thinks used to be a little girl's dress with his foot.

"It's getting harder for you to wake up after you see me."

Tsuyoshi shrugs but doesn't deny it. "And it's getting harder to call you here in the first place, but I'll make do."

"And what happens when you can't?"

"Can't what, wake up or call you?"

"Either."

"You already know I don't care about not waking up." Tsuyoshi offers Koichi a sideways smile and someone starts screaming in one of the rooms down the hall. He thinks about all the things that he's done, all the lines that he's crossed and the myriad ways he's found to scare himself into bad dreams, just so Koichi will be there when he closes his eyes. He doesn't think that any of them compare to the things he's willing to do to be able to keep Koichi right here beside him. "And I'm not worried about the other. I'm sure I'll always be able to think of something."

ooo

After that first night, it's a very long time before Tsuyoshi sees Koichi again. At first he thinks it's because the other is avoiding him or busy, or that he _can't_ visit him again, but then it happens.

He's waiting for the train after work, leaning against a pillar and watching the people around him with a lazy sort of disinterest. It's a Wednesday, and not much of a Wednesday at that, and it's been almost three months since he'd written on the back of his pillow. He's bought dream books and read articles on the internet and done everything that he can think of to try to get Koichi to come to him again, but none of it seems to make any difference. Every night he hopes that Koichi will be there when he closes his eyes and every morning he wakes up disappointed.

He's at the point where he thinks that maybe he's just crazy, that Koichi was only ever in his head to begin with and that he's being denied seeing him by his own mind as some subconscious form of punishment. The thought is half-formed in his head, swirling around between all the _what ifs_ and the _but hows_ , when a woman a few feet ahead of him catches his eye.

She's plain looking, average almost to a fault in her sensible black shoes and her nondescript blue dress, with her dark, medium length hair gathered in a knot at the base of her neck. She's the type of person that he sees hundreds, thousands of everyday; one of the faceless masses who make up the larger crowd, the people that you forget about almost as soon as you see them. He stares at her for a long moment, knowing he'll forget her as soon as he looks away.

And then, just before he can look away, as the platform beneath them begins to vibrate and the familiar sound of a train fills the station, she takes two steps to the edge of the platform, turns her head to look right at the oncoming train, and jumps.

Tsuyoshi can't get the image out of his head for a long time afterwards; that night after he gets home he ends up pacing his apartment for hours and hours, unable to sleep. When he finally ends up passing out on his couch sometime just after three, he dreams of the woman's face and her boring blue dress and he hears the screams of the other people around him. He watches as the train doors open and blood pours out of them, running off the sides of the platform and dripping down onto the tracks.

He's frozen to the spot, terrified, and the part of his mind that know it's all a dream wants desperately to wake up _right now_.

He shuts his eyes and turns away from it all and when he opens them again, Koichi is standing right beside him.


End file.
